MT AL­BERT GRAM­MAR

MAGS are not a wild­card, in the strictest sense, hav­ing won 22 1A ti­tles, but they did place sev­enth last sea­son with a young side. That youth is now ma­tur­ing into Year 12-13 rugby men of qual­ity, so this unit has the goods to crack the semi­fi­nals. There are chips off the ol’ All Blacks blocks in half­back Sa­lyn Tonu’u (son of Ofisa) and cen­tre Caleb Clarke (son of Eroni), MAGS’ ath­let­ics cham­pion. “Last year we were young, but we’ve got 20 re­turn­ing, zero new to the school, so we are 100 per cent about de­vel­op­ment. That young team has ma­tured as a group,” says Moon. The First XV has been put through pre-sea­son paces by Keven Mealamu at his Takanini gym, so should be in top shape to play the MAGS style, phys­i­cal then ex­pan­sive.

RIGHT: TON­GAN THOR Daniel Tupou was a marked man on and off the field for SHC in 2014.